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Aaaah London, what a glamorous town London is! A town where everything’s possible, where dreams come true! Back to reality. So I went to the One World Media “kick-start your foreign correspondent career” event yesterday, and it was great. I mean it. First there was a conversation between the former director of the BBC World Service, Phil Harding, and Alex Crawford, Sky News’ special correspondent who is based in South Africa and flew overnight for the event. Alex was the first reporter to broadcast live from Tripoli’s Green Square as the rebels took over. She’s reported from all over the world, including some very dangerous war zones and has been arrested, abducted, interrogated and shot at. Explaining how one eventually gets to cover war zones Alex said “war zones are like the world cup, you don’t start playing football one day and play the world cup the next, you have to go through the second, first division, everything before you eventually get there. Being a foreign...

I've just spent ten days waking up at 5.30 or 6 am sometimes but rarely later (6.30 or 7) to go on the set of the new film "At the Heart of the Battle" that will be showcased for years to come at the new Napoleonic museum of Belgium. The film, directed by the acclaimed Belgian director Gérard Corbiau, recreates the battle of Waterloo and aims to place, as its title might give away, at the heart of the action, using groundbreaking technology. I had the luck and joy of witnessing the shoot as a member of the press. Other press organisations visited the set during an organised session (I have a couple of hilarious stories about the most ignorant BBC presenter ever, if you're nice I'll tell you a little later). Ten days interviewing interesting people, taking some amazing shots of horse charges, troops marching in the sunset light, a cavalier falling off his horse repeatedly. I must say it was very impressive. Ten days of writing features of different aspects of ...

Unless you've been living in a cave or have just woken up from a long coma like Schumacher, you know the football world cup has started in Brazil. Tonight Belgium is playing Algeria, and even if I had no intention of knowing this fact I do because this "info" has been forced down our throats all day long on the national "news." All day long the national radio and TV "news" report opened with amazingly long featured about the football match. This so appalling to me as this is not newsworthy and as far as I know the world has stopped so everyone can focus on the football. Where are all the journalists? Probably in front of their TV. Thousands of people have been forced out of their homes at gun point in Rio in the name of football and entertainment, thousands have been massacred because they didn't want to leave. But that, the "news" don't talk about. The world is silent. And the "news" don't mention how not a ...

Today I voted. First, there were the road works. Every time there is an election in Belgium, they block all the roads to fix them up so everyone knows how awesome our rulers are. And yet everybody is just annoyed; what is usually a ten-minute drive becomes a 25-minute one, the usual bus stops are moved to streets you've never even heard of and you're just supposed to find them, and if you decide to walk, if you don't slip on the sand caused by the works, it will just be blown into your eyes by the wind. And every election is the same, although our politicians deny this fact. Then there were the installation of massive wood panels for political party members to display their photos, as if that was going to make you go "oh this guy there looks awesome with his stupid smile, Imma vote for him!" They seriously all look more stupid and fake than the one next to them. All these posters pollute our sight as if our neighbourhoods weren't ugly enough already. An...

Yesterday marked my final day  of work, and in five days, I'll be heading home . You cannot imagine how happy I am to have left work!!!! Don't get me wrong, I consider myself to be a hard worker but the conditions under which I have been working in the last three months can be described as bullying, professional harassment, psychological harassment, etc. These words come from my colleagues and there is a consensus, people have left after two, three weeks and another is leaving very soon. But now, on to better things. Today I will visit an NGO , an umbrella group that focuses on helping the Palestinians in the Jerusalem area, because they are often forgotten by the international NGO's which tend to focus more on Gaza and the West Bank, and the Palestinians here are residents but not citizens. I am currently deleting all my files on my old PC so I can give it to them to give to a needy family. This week is Pessach so it will limit me in my previously planned travels ...

My work experience in Israel is getting to a close... Juste a few more days of work left, a couple of free days and boom, back to Brussels. Wow. Has it really been that long? Almost three months have gone by but sometimes it feels like it's just been a couple of weeks. What to say... This experience has been incredibly enriching, eye-opening and a real challenge. Many a time did I want to quit, a couple of times I ended up in tears after a long day of not being treated very well (not to be rude...). But I couldn't give up, not when I was so close to the end. I don't like looking back on things, looking forward is the way! But in the situation that I don't actually know what is to come yet, I guess that gives me the time to look at these three months. I won't bore you with a deep analysis and will rather opt for a short list of points... Work:  Exhausting. I am trying really hard to think of what I have learnt but nothing is coming to my mind... I have m...

I have been absent in the last two weeks but this fact can easily be explained by the presence of my mum and grandma who were here for the first time. I tried spending as much time as I could with them, juggling between them and work. I even established my headquarters in the apartment I rented for them. But because I'm nice and all, I present you, in pictures yet, the highlights of my two-week-absence : Three crazy generations... Massada birds If you happen to know what kind of bird this is, please share! A little urbex on the way back from the dead sea The Wailing Wall Ruins from the 2006 bombardment of Haifa. This house has been converted into a stable. Flea market in downtown Haifa. Abra Kadabra! Haifa The liberal mosque of Akko. And its inside. Akko shuq. He can smell it, can you smell it? What? The food!! The old port of Akko. Old Akko. Akko shuq. A mural in Nachlaot, Jerus...